


Hold Me

by EvilDime



Category: Captain America (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Angst, Captain America: Civil War (Movie) Spoilers, Drama, Gen, Skin Hunger, hopelessness, mildly suicidal
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-05-03
Updated: 2018-03-23
Packaged: 2018-06-06 05:18:55
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,445
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6739939
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/EvilDime/pseuds/EvilDime
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>During the entire Civil War movie, Steve and Bucky do not hug even once. ...I felt vicariously touch-starved.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Disclaimer: I do not own Captain America nor the Winter Soldier, obviously, and make no money with this.  
> The first three chapters of this were mostly done before I saw Black Panther, so this is not compliant with the movie.  
> This fic was on hold for about a year because I couldn't decide whether to write trash or gen fic or what. I finally got the trash out of my system (elsewhere) and am ready to move on; might hint at it somewhere along the line, though. Updates for this will still be few and slow. Sorry.

Steve is in his room.

Bucky takes a moment to simply appreciate this fact, to bathe in the warmth of Steve being _here_ , and _alive._ They've shown him newspapers, back when he still had all his memories, with articles describing Steve's heroic sacrifice, the futile search, and finally his memorial service.

Bucky does not remember everything now - just random flashes of memory that hit him suddenly and without warning - but that night is very clear in his mind. The night a part of his soul died. 

Steve turns around, and while he is not the skinny, sickly kid Bucky has grown up with, this other form is still familiar, the look on his face so very much  _Steve_ that Bucky wants to cry. 

He  feels drawn toward Steve, but hesitates, torn between mistrust of his own programming and the desire to be... to... Not sure what it even is he desires, Bucky stays where he is until the army arrives and the moment is lost. 

* * *

Bucky does not look at the restraints that close around his wrists. 

His arms. 

His thighs, his legs. 

He looks straight ahead past the glass of the cage that is too much like Hydra's cryo chamber. He does not want to lose his grip on the present, does not want to forget that this is not Hydra, that he is no longer the Winter Soldier. 

So he keeps his eyes fixed on Steve, and feels calmed by the knowledge that his best friend is there to watch over him while he is helpless. Steve may have gotten him into trouble countless times - there were just too many incidents for the general idea not to have returned to him by now - but morally, at least, he has never steered Bucky wrong. Where Steve went, Bucky would follow,  because it was the right thing to do.

Till the end of the line. 

Bucky hopes this isn't it - him stuck in this cage, Steve accused of abetting an infamous assassin. It is not unthinkable that at least Bucky will be convicted of the crimes he  _knows_ he is guilty of, and be put somewhere not even Steve can come see him. 

But. 

At least the killing will stop. 

Bucky takes comfort in that knowledge. When Steve is taken away and his cage is rolled into a lightless underground cell too much like any number of Hydra facilities, he clings to the fact that Steve has let him go with these people. Steve trusts them, ergo Bucky is safe. 

He presses his arms and legs more firmly into the restraints, wanting the physical reminder that he is incapable now of doing further harm. He is safe. 

"Желание. … Ржaвый ..."

Safety is an illusion. 

Seventy years of Hydra have  taught him that, and a single look at Steve has let him forget it. Bucky feels the blood drain from his face. He presses harder against his restraints. They can hold him, can't they?

No. They cannot hold the Winter Soldier. If this man finishes the litany of code words, there will be no way out. No escape. 

"… Возвращение на родину. …"

Safety is an illusion. 

Bucky rages against his bonds. He has to break them before that man gets control of him, has to - 

* * *

He slowly swims up from the fog. Fear grips him when he realizes his Arm is trapped and he instinctively raises the other one to protect himself.  Only after far too many seconds of uncertainty, the forms of Steve and his friend materialize from the fog, and Bucky hesitantly lowers the arm. 

Little by little, the past hours come back to him. It is good, he thinks, that they immobilized his arm. He is dangerous.

This time, he does not even consider stepping closer to Steve when he has the chance. His caution from before has been justified. He must not endanger Steve.

He has to stay away.

* * *

 

The following hours deeply ingrain that resolve in Bucky's mind. The heroes of their time, all hunting Steve, shooting at him, punching him, going for serious damage - all because of him.  They are keping Steve from doing what he thinks is right. Because of Bucky. 

And maybe, Bucky thinks, maybe Steve is really wrong in this instance. Maybe Bucky isn't worth fighting over.  He has killed. So many times. So many people. 

He wishes he had never woken up after the fall. 

But he has a mission. Steve is not safe while there are five other Winter Soldiers out there and a madman holds the key to activating them. He has to lead Steve to them, so distance from Steve is impossible. 

But he can sure as hell keep from getting even closer. 

* * *

It is over. 

There are no more Winter Soldiers left, bar him. T'Challa is granting them sanctuary, so Steve will be safe. Bucky knows that Steve will not stay here, will not remain safely hidden away while there is injustice to battle; but at least he will have a place to return to should things head further south. Also, Bucky suspects that after Steve spared his life, Iron Man will be less willing to go over Steve's dead body to get at Bucky. 

Steve is safe. 

Safety is an illusion. 

Steve is safe. 

Again, Bucky feels torn. He wants to step closer to Steve, to... make sure he is not hurt? No, that is not it. To... to reassure himself that Steve is really there, maybe. To get... to have... to... 

No. He must keep his distance. He is not safe for Steve. 

Safety is an illusion. 

There is something he is missing, Bucky thinks. Some piece of the puzzle that would let him make sense of his feelings. Explain this desire to take that one step closer to Steve even though it is dangerous. Maybe if he could find it, he would feel justified in taking that step and... and...?

"I need to do this, Steve. Until my programming is broken, I am not safe to be around."

As the restraints of the cryo tank close around his biceps, the desire to reach out with his one remaining arm grows, and Bucky still does not know why. The bonds hold him steady, though, and Bucky calmly gives up. 

For now, he is safe. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A/N: I will frankly admit that I hated Bucky's decision to go back into cryo. I currently can't come up with a way to make that all better, so for now, I'll stick with making it a little worse. ; )


	2. Out of Cryo

Bucky never imagined the recovery from deep programming would be easy. But he hasn't really thought it would take this long and require so much work on his part, either.

The first time they wake him up, it starts pretty much like he expected: He is kept trapped in the restraints, cleaned of the fluids that have kept him frozen as well as can be managed given the tight bonds, then left alone until he is mostly lucid. Once he consciously looks around, signalling his awareness and willingness to cooperate by way of several slow blinks, T'Challa and three doctors enter the room and ask him questions.

T'Challa's people have been very thorough. They have found not one, but five copies of the little red book and taken meticulous note of any and all variances between them. They have sifted through the Hydra files the Black Widow has dumped to the internet on Steve's orders with a fine-toothed comb and picked up everything referring to the Winter Soldier that they could decrypt. Still there isn't enough information, and they hope Bucky can fill in the blanks.

Is it only this sequence of ten words that will make Bucky compliant or are there other triggers? Other languages, or maybe gestures, sounds, smells that will provoke certain reactions? Is he aware of what he is doing as he is doing it?

Bucky tries to answer as best he can, but there isn't much he can tell them. For every answer he gives, two more unanswered questions pop up.

_Like the heads of a Hydra._

He suppresses the grim smile that wants to twist his lips at the thought. He is Hydra's work through and through.

"How was the actual conditioning performed?"

All his muscles tense at once in remembered pain. He hears the doctors' concerned shouts, unable to answer them. Bright flashes of agony sear through his nerves as the memories hit him.

_"James Buchanan Barnes." Heat flares through the stump of his left arm. "3255-" The heat increases as his torturer dressed in a doctor's scrubs turns a dial. Bucky screams. "-557. Born in Brooklyn, 19-" He gasps. "Nineteen-"_

_The numbers lose all meaning. Then a kind of metal dish is lowered onto his head, and the heat from his arm stretches all the way into his head, burning out every last thought._

_"One," he moans. "One. Nine. Seventeen."_

_He doesn't know what those numbers used to mean. Now, they mean pain._

….

_"What are you?"_

_"An American soldier, you slimy piece of- aaargh!"_

_"You are not a man. You haff no natcionality. You are a veapon. Vhere I aim you, you vill fire."_

_Pain. His whole world is pain. Empty stomach twisting itself into knots, left arm lit on fire as though it were still attached, throat screamed raw, his head filled with so much_ noise.  _Electricity sparking throughout his nervous system. White-hot pain everywhere. In him, around him. The air he tastes is pain._

_"Vat do you vant?"_

_Want... want... He does not remember. But then he does. There is a flash of blond hair, the memory of a warm smile, a joke called back over one bony shoulder._

_"Home...," he croaks._

_"You vill never go home," the voice says, and more pain follows._

…

_"What are you?"_

_"A weapon."_

_"What do you want?"_

_"To obey. To serve."_

_"What do you fear?"_

_"Nothing," he answers, while the image of a freight wagon rushing along a snowy mountainside burns brightly inside his mind._

* * *

The next time they wake him, he is given several injections as well as a liquid to drink. T'Challa explains that they are designed to strengthen his will against the programming. Then one of the doctors reads the list of code words, and Bucky's world goes away.

* * *

Every time he wakes strapped in the restraints rather than in the rubble of a building he has destroyed, killing all the people within it, Bucky heaves a sigh of relief. That first time was close. His will had indeed been strengthened - the will to do as the doctor commanded him: to 'be himself'.

He has raged at T'Challa for hours after that idiocy. Who did they think they were talking to after programming the Winter Solider? What did they believe it meant for the world's most feared assassin to 'be himself'?

He is just glad the last of the restraints hobbled him long enough for T'Challa to stick several tranq darts into him.

* * *

There are no more close calls like that one. From now on, every time they wake Bucky to try out another brilliant idea, they talk it over with him first. They agree on some points, disagree on others, but Bucky gets final say in everything they do.

One thing he is adamant about are the restraints. They are not to open them. Ever.

T'Challa doesn't like it. "You are not our prisoner. When we are not testing the code phrases, you are not a danger to us. I have no wish to keep you in chains when it is not at all necessary, my friend. It is not healthy for your body or your mind to force you into stillness for so long."

"No," Bucky says. "All it takes is one spy infiltrating your organisation and _talking_ to me and I _will_ be dangerous. I won't have it!"

They've made sure something like the Zemo situation cannot happen again. Bucky's bonds have been reinforced after that first failure. They are now Winter Soldier proof and can only be deactivated by a pass phrase nobody but T'Challa knows. This will not ward off people trying to kill Bucky; but all things considered, he finds that to be the smaller of two evils. As long as he can't be set loose to murder more civilians himself, he will take that risk.

_Steve wouldn't like this,_ he catches himself thinking. He ruthlessly squashes the thought. 

Steve isn't fucking  _here_ to dislike it. 

* * *

The first few times they woke him, Bucky stayed out of cryo only long enough to answer some highly relevant questions and most times be subjected to a test crafted after lengthy scientific research and preparation. But all those tests have failed and what is left now is simple therapy.

Not that there is anything simple about that.

The day they tell him there is no use in him going back into cryo, Bucky first truly understands what it might mean to 'recover' from what was done to him. There is no magical cure. There is no incomprehensible science voodo that will reset his brain to what it was pre-Hydra.

He is fucked up. And he will likely always remain so. All he _might_ possibly achieve - if he puts in a tremendous amount of work - is to be slightly less dangerous to other people. But as for his own guilt trips, anxieties, nightmares, shell shock and various other triggers? Those won't just go away either. He will have to deal with them the same, hard way; just like any other war veteran. Well, any other war veteran that served for seventy years doing special ops for the enemy.

Bucky feels cold. Not the cold that will turn into the dreamless cryo sleep, but a more encompassing, overwhelming internal ice, leaving him frozen in the face of the task they set before him.

In retrospect, maybe it was naïve of him to think that he would just have to go back to cryo once, then when he woke he'd be James Buchanan Barnes again, Steve Rogers's best friend and an all-around pretty charming guy, if Steve and the exhibits in the Smithsonian are to be believed. But now that this hope is destroyed, he fully realizes how much he's relied on precisely that.

He wanted to be Steve's Bucky again. He'd hoped to be free of all the baggage, the guilt and the pain that came with being the Winter Soldier.

But that dream is dead, now. Working through the trigger words will be bad enough - the doctors have predicted a time frame of years rather than months; if he wants to tackle everything else, as well, it may just take him the next seventy years. He will never again be that Bucky Barnes from Brooklyn.

And he won't be Steve's. Because apparently Steve isn't interested in this broken Tin Soldier any more.

He never once showed up.


End file.
